Carol's Chickens

Since the girls have been mixed both Popcorn and Maple have followed the flock into the chicken shed each night. They usually settle together in the corner underneath the corner perch and I move them up to the perch each night. Just one night Maple made it up to the perch on her own. I thought it was progress but she hasn’t done it since then. I am sure they will perch themselves eventually.

The new girls are mixing really well now and I have put the run back to normal with the bit by the patio opened up again. Yesterday I removed the second feeding station from the bottom half of the run as they are coming up to the patio area now.

The only change I have made is that I have left the third nest box in position. I didn’t want it on the patio as it might tempt Mango and Cloud to sit on it at bedtime but I thought it might be useful to have an extra one.

Gold went broody again five days ago and has just come out of it today. She had laid thirteen eggs in nineteen days. Storm has gone broody today for the first time this year. She had laid twenty six eggs in three months.

Popcorn had laid three little eggs. The second one two days after the first then the third, one day after the last. Then this morning there were two soft shelled eggs under her roost spot despite her having laid yesterday.

I think that what has happened is that Popcorn produced a double yolk which sometimes happens with new layers but her system tried to put a shell round both yolks and didn’t have enough calcium for two shells. Luckily because her eggs are so small she didn’t have a problem laying them. She looked absolutely fine this morning.

Hopefully this is just a blip. It seems like she is laying too many eggs too quickly but hopefully that will settle down.

I scrambled her eggs and added chopped tomato and gave them to the flock who wolfed them down in no time at all. I hope Popcorn takes a day off egg laying tomorrow.

It was a real blow to lose Silver at only a year old. She was not only very pretty but she had a lovely nature and was really friendly and easy to handle. She was also a good egg layer.

Silver had a happy time in our flock albeit too short a time. She is already missed. Goodbye silver.

We had Silver put to sleep today. It has been so very upsetting.

Silver stopped eating altogether a few days ago. Yesterday we had stopped giving her the med’s and instead we were dropping food directly into her beak.

It really amounts to force feeding her as I was opening her beak and dropping in pellets, sunflower hearts and chopped tomato. She was fighting against it and flicking most of the food out with only a small amount going down. I knew this couldn’t go on as it was stressful for her and for us. I knew if she wouldn’t eat then force feeding her was only prolonging the agony for her and for us.

We think she must have had something in her gut twisted or blocked because at first when she stopped eating normally she was eating the scrambled egg but then she would be twisting her neck as if struggling to get it up or down. She then refused to eat at all and no longer twisted her neck. The vet agreed with us and said the kindest thing was to have her put to sleep.

I asked if I could see her afterwards. The vet was very kind and called me in to see her when she had gone. She said it was very peaceful. I couldn’t help crying. It never gets any easier.

This was the hardest decision to have a girl put to sleep yet, because at times she still looked normal and was still strong when we picked her up. She had also laid two eggs at the beginning of this but had then stopped laying as she wasn’t eating enough.

Silver was only a year old and we had only had her since 12th August last year so only ten months. Yet she was so much a part of the flock. She had such a lovely nature. She was really friendly and really pretty. It is so sad.

I will do a tribute to her tomorrow when I have looked through my photos. She is already very much missed.

Yesterday afternoon Popcorn was running up and down the dividing wire of the section that Silver is separated in as if desperate to get in there. I suddenly wondered if she wanted to lay an egg. I let her into Silver’s section of the run and she went straight into the little coup/nest box that she had used during the new girls’ time in this side of the run.

She started scratching around and I realised she did want to lay. This took me by surprise as she is only five months old and I hadn’t expected this so soon. Later I checked back and Popcorn was out of the nest box. There was a tiny egg with a faint blood streak on it.

I took this as a size comparison. Popcorn’s eggs should end up the size of Red’s egg, on the right, as they are both wyandottes. Well done Popcorn! It’s lucky I mixed the girls together when I did. I will now change the pellets over to layers pellets.

Silver has shown no improvement at all. We have now been treating her for four days and there is no change. She is now refusing to eat anything including the scrambled egg. She is still strong and fast when I go to pick her up as she doesn’t like me keep putting things in her beak and yet I know that if she doesn’t eat we will lose her. Other times she just sits hunched up and looking miserable.

Today I put some pellets and chopped tomato in her beak. Putting bits of a tablet in her beak made me realise I could put pellets in her beak but it is only a few and not nearly enough. I really don’t feel there is any point continuing with the med’s and I just don’t know what to do. We feel there must be some obstruction causing her to twist her neck and now to stop eating. It is only a matter of time before a painful decision needs to be made.

It’s a bank holiday Monday today. I am now thinking that I will have to take Silver back to the vets tomorrow to be put to sleep. I am feeling so upset right now.

I am writing this in hindsight because over the last few days all my time has been taken up with trying to treat Silver. The first thing I noticed was that Silver looked hunched. She then stood up and started twisting her neck. She was due to lay and she had laid one soft shelled egg a couple of weeks ago so I thought that she was struggling to get an egg laid.

Silver then went to the nest box. She laid her egg and it had a good shell. I thought she would bounce back after laying but she still didn’t look good. She was going to the water but I wasn’t seeing her eating.

The following day Silver still didn’t look good. At one point she was stretched out in the sun with her eyes closed.

Silver was either looking like this or standing upright and twisting her neck. At this point I knew we needed to go to the vet. Luckily I phoned the vet and got an appointment right away.

I had put her symptoms in an internet search and the only thing it was coming up with was wry neck which can be a lack of vitamin E and can be cured with vitamin E/Selinium. It seemed unlikely as I have been putting vitamins in the water and I checked them and they include vitamin E. Apparently the Selinium helps the vitamin E to be absorbed.

The vet stood Silver on the floor to see how she moved and she looked normal. The vet weighed her, she then checked her heart which was strong and her temperature which was normal She checked her vent which was clean and no egg stuck, which I knew, as she had just laid. She felt her breast and there was no fluid and checked her eyes and beak which were all clear. She said she was skinny which proved, as I thought, she wasn’t eating.

The vet said all her vital signs seemed perfectly normal. At that moment Silver closed her eyes and starting falling forward in a sort of rocking movement. The vet said she could see something was very wrong but she was at a loss. Silver didn’t twist her neck while at the vets but the vet took video on her phone of Silver falling forward with her eyes closed. She said she would call her colleague and send the video as he is an expert on birds and exotics. He said he would call her back.

The vet gave me a liquid pain killer to put in her beak once a day and an antibiotic in tablet form to put a quarter in her beak twice a day. She said to order the vitamin E/Selinium from Amazon as the vet doesn’t stock it. That came the following day and is a jell which needs a pea sized bit to her beak once a day. I know she hasn’t got a blockage because the tablet is going down. I was worried as I had never given a tablet before but the vet said pop it in her beak and she will swallow it which turned out to be true.

In the mean time the vets colleague called back and he was also at a loss. The vet said to separate Silver from the flock because as we don’t know what it is we don’t know if it’s contagious.

This meant speeding up mixing the flock. The new girls had been with the flock all day without any problem and they had now had their month on growers so I changed all the feeders to fifty/fifty growers and layers except for Silver’s dish. I put Silver in the smaller part of the run and opened up the bottom of the run so the new girls could escape any chasing.

In between times Silver has moments of seeming normal and yesterday she again laid an egg so it’s definitely not an egg problem. We can’t eat the eggs because of the antibiotic so I am feeding them back to Silver.

The vet said to give Silver scrambled egg to try to get her eating which I did. Silver has been having a little scrambled egg and a few sunflower hearts but that’s all she is eating. I tried mash and chopped tomato as well but she will only eat a little egg. I know that if she stops eating we are in real trouble.

We have been giving her all three med’s to her beak. At least she is very easy to handle. I have done more research on wry neck and now don’t think it is that as I have watched video and with wry neck their head is lolling to one side or facing upside down. I can’t find anything about twisting the neck. We are at a loss. All we can do is continue doing everything we are doing. I will try calling the farm she came from today to see if they have any advice.

In other news the new girls mixed really well. They have followed the flock into the chicken shed both nights. They settled in the corner rather than perching but they haven’t been used to perching at night. I moved them up to the perch and they stayed there. I am sure they will get the hang of it in their own time.

Silver settled on the shelf in the shelter and I moved her into the little coup. Silver has moments of looking better and I think she is on the mend then she relapses again. Only time will tell if she comes through this but we are throwing everything at it.

Edit

We are now thinking that Silver may have something stuck in her throat. We have noticed that she seems to look more normal then she has some scrambled egg and then she starts twisting her neck. So we have added to her regime giving her some olive oil and then gently massaging her lower neck. We are just trying everything in the hope that we can get her through this.

As always Mango and Cloud are so in sync. When Cloud stopped laying because she was broody Mango stopped laying even though she wasn’t broody. Then Mango came back in lay yesterday and Cloud came back in lay today.

I had the girls mixed for the day and Cloud chose the new girls’ little coup/next box to lay her egg in.

The girls have been together all day today with no problem so I think I am ready to move on to the next stage.

This afternoon I set up a third feeding station in the bottom end of the new girls run. Then I mixed the girls together. Today they didn’t seem to be taking much notice of each other. I ended up leaving them together all afternoon. The new girls didn’t go to the ladders at all. I think we are finally getting somewhere.

I could tell that Mango was getting ready to come back into lay after a break of two weeks. She was very vocal and was looking in the nest boxes. Once I opened up so that the girls could mix Mango settled in the new girls’ little coup. As usual anything their side must be better.

Mango went on to lay her egg in the new girls’ nest box.

Red also laid for the second time since her broody break. Snow, Ginger, Storm and Silver also laid giving us our first, six egg day, for ages.

Two more girls back in lay has given us a boost but Snow and Gold will probably go broody soon which will put us back again. They have reached their normal amount of eggs laid before going broody.

I am so pleased that mixing went better today and will try leaving the flock together all day tomorrow. Friday will be a month that the new girls have been with us and they can then go on to fifty fifty growers and layers pellets so if it continues to go well I will try mixing them full time.

It seems that it is difficult and then it suddenly seems to change. I am feeling more confident about them being together now. I will see how it goes tomorrow.

Edit, again!

Snow has now gone broody after laying her regulation eight eggs in fourteen days. She returned to the corner of the chicken shed, where she lays her eggs, in the late afternoon.

Mixing the girls has gone slower than I expected. I tried putting Mango, Cloud and Ginger on the new girls side to take the worst chasers out of the equation. It didn’t work. Gold, Storm and Silver who had taken no notice of the new girls before now constantly chased them.

The next day I put Gold and Snow in with the new girls. They took no notice of the new girls and the four got along fine but it’s not really helping with getting them mixing.

Yesterday I mixed them and it seemed to be going fine for a while. I thought we were making progress but then suddenly the new girls were constantly being chased again. They once again ended up at the top of the ladder.

At this point, photo above, I thought it was going so well but then suddenly the chasing started again. The new girls were getting stressed so I separated them again.

In other news, on the egg front, there has been a slow down. Cloud remained broody for nearly two weeks. The odd thing is that the day Cloud went broody, Mango stopped laying. She hasn’t laid for two weeks but hasn’t gone broody either.

Red hasn’t yet started laying after her broody spell but I think she will come back into lay soon. Storm is only laying two or three eggs a week. Gold, Snow, Silver and Ginger are laying. They are now alternating the days they are laying so are we are getting two eggs a day. Snow and Gold will probably go broody again soon though.

It will be good when the new girls start laying to get a few more eggs. First though I need to get them mixed. They always get there in the end so I guess I will have to just keep giving them time together.

Edit

Red has just laid an egg after a break of eleven days. Well done Red!

Both yesterday and today I gave the new girls an hour with the main flock. It went about the same both days. Snow, Gold, Silver, Storm and Red took no notice of the new girls.

As I expected it was bottom girl Cloud that was first to kick off. Cloud and Maple went at each other with ruffs raised until Cloud chased Maple away. Next it was Ginger who chased both Maple and Popcorn and grabbed their feathers at the back of their neck. Mango briefly chased the new girls but not to the extent of Cloud and Ginger.

The new girls retreated to the top of the ladder and stayed there. At this point I decided it was pointless to carry on as they were not mixing anyway so I returned both lots to their own sides.

While the girls were mixed I moved the new girls’ dishes to the chickens’ patio area otherwise I knew pellets would get flicked out into the dirt and dirt would get scratched into the water. The main flock saw these new dishes as far superior to their own of course.

On the second day I had planned to put Cloud and Ginger on the new girls side so the new girls could have a more peaceful time mixing with the rest of the flock but as soon as I opened the gate the main flock rushed in. I decided to leave them all together and try this plan the next day.

It started off the same with the main flock not seeming to notice the new girls. As soon as Cloud and Ginger noticed them though they chased them until they retreated to the top of the ladder again.

Tomorrow I will try again with my plan to put Cloud and Ginger on the new girls side. I will choose my moment and be a bit more careful when I open the gate. It is early days yet and they have plenty of time to get used to each other.

Today I switched the girls on the opposite sides of the run. Maple and Popcorn immediately went down to the bottom of the run.

At the end of their first week the new girls found the ladder and the branch perch above it on their side of the run. I just never had my camera on me whenever they were on the ladder.

I stood behind them and tried to guide them towards the patio.

I gave them an hour on the opposite sides.

The main flock have been desperate to get into the new girls’ side but once in there they wanted to come back out again. The new girls also clearly wanted to get back to their own side. I decided that was enough for the first day and put them back on their own sides.

I think what they really want is to be together. The next step will be to give them some time together. Maybe tomorrow.